It is good news, indeed, to hear more brownfield assessment funding will be making its way to our region.

Officials with the Brooke-Hancock-Jefferson Metropolitan Planning Commission announced Monday that the Brooke-Hancock Region IX Regional Planning and Development Council has been awarded a $1.2 million assessment grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The funds, which are eligible for use in Hancock and Brooke counties in West Virginia, and Jefferson County in Ohio, will assist with the costs of conducting an analysis of targeted properties – in this case, properties in Mingo Junction, Weirton and the area of Power located near Beech Bottom.

The funding typically is used on former industrial property, such as the former Taylor, Smith and Taylor Pottery site in Chester which is now home to the Rock Springs Business Park, or properties which once housed Weirton Steel or Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel.

In the last 10 years, close to 70 such sites have been inventoried and assessed in our region, with many cleared of contamination and redeveloped to make it usable for future businesses.

Without federal funding such as this, there are many opportunities our part of the country would not have had. That’s something to think about when hearing about the various programs being eyed for elimination these days.

If it weren’t for these assessment grants, bringing in $2.4 million in federal funds and helping to leverage more than $1.3 billion in investment from other sources, much of the former industrial property in our three counties would probably still be unusable. Businesses would not have come to them. Jobs would not have been created.

We appreciate the continued efforts of those involved in bringing those federal funds and investments to the Ohio Valley, and hope this leads to more growth in the future.